Mare's Mess

From 1993 to 1996 I taught at a middle school in Norfolk, Virginia. It was an inner-city school – about 90% of the students were black and about 75% of them lived in public housing projects. When I first got the job, I was terrified. I didn’t have “To Sir With Love,” “Stand and Deliver,” or “Welcome Back Kotter” in mind when I decided I wanted to be a teacher. I pictured more of my own school experiences. I really had no idea what to expect and I wasn’t sure I would be able to handle it. But I needed the job so I took it.

It turns out I could handle it. I loved the kids and they loved me too. Of course, there were a few kids who were really special to me and one of them was Julia. Julia was an awesome kid. She was smart and funny and so sweet. Sometimes she hung out with me after school and she spent some time at our house hanging out with Matt and me. Julia would talk to me about everything. I got to know her family and when Julia was diagnosed with Lupus I spent time with her and her family at the hospital. That was 11 years ago and Julia and I have actually kept in touch off and on over the years. She sent me a graduation announcement when she graduated from high school. She was so proud that she was actually graduating, and I was proud of her too.

A few weeks ago I got a phone call from Julia. I hadn’t heard from her in about 5 years. The last time I talked with her she had called because she was going to Norfolk State but she was having trouble paying for her next semester. She wondered if she could borrow some money from us and she would pay us back. Julia had never asked for money before so I knew this must be important. I talked with Matt and we decided we’d help her out. We also agreed that we would consider this a gift and not expect to get it back. Julia insisted that she would pay us back one day and I told her that was fine. After sending the money, I didn’t hear from Julia again until this recent phone call.

Julia’s phone call brought back lots of memories. I remembered the time that Julia and Patrick, another one of my student’s, became boyfriend and girlfriend. One day after school they had both stayed to hang out and I went down to the office for something. When I came back they were kissing in my room – a very sweet kiss, not groping and mashing. They were both embarrassed, which tells you a lot about them because I had students who could have been having sex when I walked in and they wouldn’t have been embarrassed.

I also remembered the boy who had been sucking on a penny and started choking on it in the middle of class. He got up and went out to the rest room. I could tell something was wrong when he left so I followed him right into the boy’s room and saw he was choking. I gave him the Heimlich and it came out. From that day on, I would tease him by asking if he could give me some change for a dollar. The thing that stood out about that incident was how this tough kid would rather go to the restroom by himself and possibly die than to ask for help and be vulnerable in front of the other kids. This was a common mindset.

I also remembered the nicknames. Julia’s older sister was “Bug” and that was just her name. I don’t know that I ever knew her real name. One kid had the nickname “Pac-Man.” I called to talk to his mom one evening when I was having trouble with him in class and his mom yells, “Pac-Man, get down here! Mrs. Sears says…” It just cracked me up that his mom even called him Pac-Man.

One of the most frustrating things about this job was the administration. It reflected badly on the principal if there were too many detentions or suspensions, so these things didn’t happen very often. For the most part, we weren’t left with a lot of disciplinary options. One of the other frustrations was grading. I could have easily failed at least half of my students if I was giving the grades they actually deserved. But I couldn’t do that because that would reflect badly on me. So I had to adjust my grading scale a bit, but even with this quite generous curve, I was sometimes told that I was failing too many students. The principal actually called me into his office one day and asked me if I’d seen the movie “Dangerous Minds” (it had just come out). I told him yes. He said that we sometimes have to use atypical strategies, like in the movie, to help these kids be successful. By continuing to fail these kids over and over again we were just beating them down so we needed to help them up by giving them grades even if they didn’t earn them. It made no sense to me and I pointed out to him that in the movie Michelle Pfeiffer never gave her kids grades they didn’t earn, she just inspired them to want to earn them. I was just waiting for him to tell me that I needed to start going out and playing pool with the kids after school. He didn’t seem to hear my comment and let me go to “think about what he’d said.” It didn’t really matter what I did because when they turned 16 (they should leave middle school at 14) the principal passed them on to high school anyway because he didn’t want 16 year olds in the building causing trouble.

I think most of us can figure out the effects of giving kids passing grades when they aren’t doing the work to earn them. We have kids passing through the system who should be learning how to be competent people, but aren’t learning anything. But the worst result is kids who know they haven’t earned the grade they’ve been given. Instead of boosting their self-esteem it actually creates laziness, self-doubt, and self-loathing. The first response is, “Why should I put any effort into this when I will pass whether I do it or not.” But the next response is “I must not be capable of doing this so they have to give me the grades since I’m not able to earn them on my own.” The actions for this thought are the same, “Why try,” but the effect on the psyche is much more damaging. They begin to doubt themselves and believe they can’t earn anything on their own unless someone gives it to them. It’s a miserable state. If you went to the projects in the middle of the day there were people and kids just wandering around doing nothing because they’d been conditioned to believe that’s all they were capable of and why bother trying to do more when the bills would be paid for whether they did anything about it or not. It’s a sad and depressing place – and actually the buildings were quite new and the grounds were fairly well cared for. What made it sad and depressing was the feeling of hopelessness that hung heavy in the air.

I see the government’s welfare handouts as nothing more than giving passing grades to people who didn’t earn them. On the surface it’s easy to say, “Oh, they have such and such situations in their life so we need to take care of them.” Sounds like someone who really cares. In reality it’s patronizing and does nothing more than create laziness and self-loathing.

Whenever the government attempts to distribute wealth to make things more equitable, it usually has the opposite effect. Take minimum wage, for instance. Sounds good on the surface. Make those greedy corporations pay their employees more money. That will move the wealth around. The fact is, minimum wage doesn’t effect corporations a whole lot. They’ve got deep pockets. But minimum wage (along with other big government regulations and taxations) kills small businesses which hope to one day be able to compete with the big corporations. Since small businesses are so impeded, the corporations have their competition taken care of for them and the money stays right where it is. The intentions may be good, but, well, you know the rest.

The same is true of welfare. I’ve heard people compare the welfare and public housing system to plantations and slavery. It’s been said that if you wanted to create a system that will keep the down and outs down you couldn’t do any better than the American welfare system. Destroy their psyche so they don’t believe they’re capable of doing more and that’s where they’ll stay! It makes me furious when people think I’m greedy and cold-hearted because I don’t want the government to take care of the poor. Nothing could be further from the truth. I think the people who condone and support government welfare are the cold-hearted ones. I think the poor do need help and guidance and role models, but all of this should be given by churches, communities, organizations, and individuals – not the government. The effect on the receiver is going to be completely different if the money is seen as an entitlement, something they are given just because they exist, than if it’s given by someone as a gift. Someone believed in them and gave them a chance even though they didn’t have to.

When Julia called me a few weeks ago, she told me that shortly after receiving the money from us she had done some jail time. A woman she worked for had been writing fake checks and got Julia in on the action. Julia said that at first she did it because she needed to pay off bills and she justified that she wasn’t stealing the money from a person, it was just coming from the bank. But she admitted that it was so easy that she got greedy and that’s why she got caught. She was embarrassed and felt badly about the money that we sent her. Of course there are people who will even take advantage of gifts given out of caring, but just as Julia wouldn’t have done what she did if it took money from a person, most people aren’t going to screw over someone with a face and a name who cares about them. But take advantage of Uncle Sam – why not?

Julia said that her life was back on track now. She has a job and is working to be on her own and she said that someday she’d repay the money we sent her. I didn’t tell Julia not to worry about paying us back. Although I don’t ever expect to get it, how awesome it would be if someday she got to the place where she was able to. How proud she would be and what a sense of accomplishment. Wouldn’t it be great if what kept her going was that she wanted to be able to repay Mrs. Sears that money someday because Mrs. Sears believed in her?

Julia, you will always have a place in my heart and in my prayers.